NEW YORK: MicroRNA can serve as a “decoder ring” for understanding complex biological processes, report chemists.
The study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences points to a new method for decrypting the biological functions of enzymes and identifying those that drive diseases.
The research focuses on a particular class of enzymes that biosynthesize carbohydrates (i.e. glycans)—complex biological molecules controlling multiple aspects of cell biology—as well as on their attendant microRNA (miRNA), which are regulatory molecules that spur changes in a cell by inhibiting protein expression.
“Carbohydrates present a challenge for analysis because their complexity and ‘noise’ that accompanies their biosynthesis make it difficult to isolate how they are involved in cellular change,” explains senior author Lara Mahal, an associate professor in New York University’s chemistry department.
“Our results show that rather than trying to trace the intricacies of this molecule’s activity, we can simply track miRNA.”
Specifically, she adds, miRNA can illuminate which glycogenes, or genes encoding glycosylation enzymes, are vital in a biological pathway.
